Doctor!
by Protector of the Gray Fortress
Summary: What was it like that day, The day that marked the end of the reign of the Master, the last day of the year that never was? What was it like to say the one word with the billions of other people on the earth?


Disclaimer: the Doctor is too marvelous to be owned by one person, even me.

Warnings: Last of the Time Lords spoilers. If you haven't seen it yet get a move on.

And it's always good form to write a review…even if it's just a word or two…hey! I'm a poet.

clears throat anyway, here you go. Thought it would be interesting to see what people were thinking when the Doctor was restored by the Archangel network.

* * *

Leslie Wallace sat, huddled in the empty room, clothed in the only tattered pair of jeans and faded blue pullover she owned…the others in the slave house had gone outside…but she stayed. It was too painful to be with the others…to watch and wait as they did.

She'd lost so many others already…been shattered so many times…her mum and baby brother cut down by the Tochlaphane before her eyes, her father taken to the labor camps never seen again. Her best mate Andrew being caught and ruthlessly executed for stealing food. And then last night she had been sitting on the stairway listening to Martha Jones, close enough to touch her…and she had watched as their hero was arrested, and the gun destroyed…and the last of her hope had shattered.

What could he do…this Doctor? A man she had only ever heard about…and then only in whispers…in tales too fantastic too believe. Stories too wonderful to be real.

She bit her lip blinking back tears…she could not cry…crying was a sign of weakness…that was one of the first things she had learned. She buried her head in her arms clutching at her short brown hair. She hadn't always been like this….crouching and hiding in the shadows. She had been an aspiring student on the day the Master had taken control…just about to take her A levels…perhaps be admitted to a university.

The battered watch on her narrow wrist beeped, and she jerked her head up. The countdown was beginning…and despite her fears she could not help wishing, praying desperately in her heart…_please! Please let it be true!_

_It can't be_. A nasty voice said in her head…the same voice that told her to run and hide, to do anything to survive even if it meant turning her back to the wrongs being done. Endless faces paraded through her head…faces of people both familiar and alien…faces that had been burned into her mind as she watched them die and starve and weep uncontrollably at the loss of loved ones. Nameless faces that she had allowed to pass her by, unmourned, unsung, unspoken for.

But what could she have done? What could one person do? The little things she had done…the food and warmth she had shared…the few people she had helped to run and hide…meant nothing compared to the chaos caused by Harold Saxon.

She curled in on herself again…trying to escape the dusty beams of light that filtered in through the boarded windows…she could not bare too look out and see the others…could not bare to hope anymore.

_'__Nothing will happen!__'_ The nasty voice said in her head…'_I__s__ that your weapon? __**Prayer!**__**'**_

Her heart froze…she stopped breathing…that was not her voice…it was Saxon's!

_'__Right across the world!__ One word__ just one thought at one moment…but with __**fifteen satellites!**__**'**_

Another voice had joined the first and she recognized it as Martha Jones.

_**'**A telepathic field, binding the whole human race together, with all of them, every single person on earth thinking the same thing at the same time and that word…is **Doctor!'**_

Leslie leapt to her feet and bolted to one of the windows…tearing at a loose board until she had it open and could gaze up at the patch of sky where the Valiant flew.

She could hear the voices of the people in the street…and thousands of voices from around the world all saying the same thing, millions gathered together hoping…feeling.

**_DOCTOR!_**

She was sobbing quietly, her heart racing…almost unconsciously she added her own voice…her own thoughts…tried to picture the Doctor as Martha Jones had described

"Doctor." She felt the power of the word on her lips…felt it within her mind…felt it join the others.

**_DOCTOR!_**

And then she heard a third voice…one thin and weary with age…but with a quality so unlike anything she had heard before.

_'I've had a whole year to tune myself into the psychic network and integrate with its matrices.'_

The voice hit her like a bolt of lightning…filling her with energy…driving away the sickening fear and despair…the haunting memories.

It was wonderful and terrible at the same time…the way a fire is comforting and dangerous all at once…the excitement that comes with the beginning of a storm.

_'I ORDER YOU TO STOP!'_ Saxon's voice wailed but it was lost among the cries that continued.

**_DOCTOR!_**

Again the wonderful voice sounded and this time it was stronger…vibrant and young.

_'One thing you can't do…stop them **thinking!**'_

Joy, pure and unfiltered filled Leslie's heart…and she laughed, feeling free for the first time in a year…she wanted to run, and leap and fly at the same time.

_'Tell me the human race is degenerate now…when they can to **this**!'_

She could see him in her mind's eye, tall and straight and powerful, with a heartbreakingly lonely face, old eyes, and a gaze that was utterly gentle. Surrounded by blue fire…

The Doctor…their Doctor…

She ran down through the dilapidated, dusty house and out into the street with the others. Running and laughing.

And then the storm hit. Clouds rolled over the sky, blocking the sun, lighting struck the ground, crackling. The earth shook. She looked up as the wind began to rip through the streets, somehow keeping her feet, the tochlaphane vanished…and everything grew still.

_

* * *

_

Leslie Wallace strolled lighthearted past a row of residential houses. She was in no hurry…she'd just taken her last A level…and was enjoying the relief and sense of freedom that always followed such an ordeal.

She whistled one of the old 40's swing songs that her Dad loved to listen too, and let her thoughts wander…Mum should just be pickin' Steven up from daycare...Dad would be drivin' home from work…she was going to go with Andrew for pizza tonight, to celebrate.

She sighed happily, breathing in the warm autumn air…than paused as she passed one white house, with a redbrick wall. Just outside the yard there was an old fashioned blue box, and leaning against it was a man…who shouldn't really have stood out so much, but for some reason caught her eye, and she had the strangest sensation that she knew this man. He was watching the house, smiling a little sadly…than he turned away and opened the door of the box to enter it.

As he did his gaze passed over Leslie, and a strange little jolt of happiness ran through her. She smiled at him, not really knowing why, and waved. His smile widened briefly…and he stepped into the box shutting the door behind him.

Leslie turned and continued down the road, and another sort of music filled her head…hauntingly beautiful... a sort of singing.

As she neared the end of the road she thought she heard a strange pulsating thrum...as though from an odd engine…but it faded quickly from her hearing.


End file.
